Update on Yarn-Weighing Crochet Adventure

Am checking in to blog the results of my design experiment with weighing yarn on a digital scale. It came close enough to perfection that I'll be using the scale for planning other designs.

I came within 2 grams (0.1 oz.) of a 100-gram skein. It's likely that I would have come up short if I had not ripped out the longest row before beginning the decrease rows.

Would you like to see the finished result? It will be a Tunisian crochet pattern on my new pattern website.

After simple damp-blocking, this triangular neckscarf relaxed into large enough dimensions to also serve as a shoulder wrap. In fact, the fabric behaved more like knitted lace while blocking. The Tunisian stitches grow to double the height of the usual Tunisian Simple Stitch.

I'll always remember finishing this project while sitting in the sun at Starbucks with my friend Colette. It was the start of a cold front that froze Florida, so I didn't notice that I was getting a January sunburn! As the freeze came, this alpaca wrap was the perfect layer with a turtleneck and cardigan.

Really Handy Gift for Crocheters & Knitters!

One of the most valuable tools in my crochet design studio is so simple and easy to find and use:

Why oh why did it take me so long to get a digital scale? How many other crocheters and knitters are in the same boat as me? If you think you might use one of these, think again: you'll definitely use it and wonder how you got along without it. It's so much easier to plan projects with whatever scrap yarns you have stashed away. Below is a mini-tutorial on one of its many uses for yarnies.

It needs to be reasonably sensitive and accurate. Of course the more so the better, but you don't need to spend a fortune. I'm happy with mine and it cost $30 at Target. It switches easily from ounces to grams. I prefer grams because 1 gram is a smaller unit of measurement than 1 ounce, so I get a more fine-tuned result.

The Urgent Situation Causing Me to Buy a Digital Scale: I wished to crochet a triangular neckwrap with one large skein of yarn (Misti Alpacas Handpainted Alpaca Sock). I planned to start at one top corner and keep increasing until I used half of the yarn, then use the other half of the yarn to decrease over the same number of rows as I increased.

The Crux of the Issue: How will I know when I've used no more than half of the one ball of yarn? Exactly when do I start decreasing instead of increasing?

First I weighed the total amount of yarn (with label, crochet hook, stitch markers removed). Yarn label says 100 grams. When I put both all yarn (crocheted and precrocheted) on scale with nothing flopping over the scale's edge, it weighed in at 103g. Isn't that nice? A 3-gram bonus.

Photo 1: When I weigh the crochet only, it says 55g! This means I need to rip out a few increase rows and start decreasing.

Photo 2: After ripping out 3 rows or so, the crochet now weighs in at 51g.

Photo 3: When I weigh just the unused yarn, it should say 52g, and it does.

I decide to flirt with danger and really put this yarn-weighing strategy to the test. Wouldn't it be deeply satisfying if I have exactly the amount of yarn needed to complete the triangle with none left over? I only gave myself a 1-gram buffer and have already started the decrease rows. I need to make sure that my gauge stays the same throughout!

Now to finish crocheting it and find out....

Heaven is: Crochet Hooks for Every Need

I'm happy to report three exciting crochet hook developments.

1) Exquisite New Crochet Hook Sets for Connoisseurs

Want to give or get the perfect gift for the next special occasion? Check out these beautiful new "Etimo" sets from a Japanese company called Tulip:

I think of them as my "Cadillac" hooks because of what they feel like to have and to hold. The size range of the gold-tone aluminum set is 3.25 mm - 6.0 mm; the range of steel thread hooks is 0.5 mm - 1.75 mm.

2) Denise Interchangeables: Now for Crocheters Too!

Knitters have long enjoyed a spiffy build-your-own-perfect-needle-for-each-project system, organized in a portable kit. Take a look at the crochet hook version here.

3) Tunisian & Double-Ended Hook Size Crisis, Addressed

Consider the L/8 mm crochet hook. For years I've had one brand (blue Crystalite) for regular crochet, and gee, none for Tunisian crochet. Eventually I found a set of "Easy Tunisian" M, N, P flexible hooks (on eBay back when they were discontinued). Note, still no L.

The next smaller size is almost* universally 6.5 mm ("K"), so with no L/8 mm, there's a 2.5 mm gap between a K and an M hook. That's too big for designing purposes. *I've seen one brand that's 7.0 mm, though not for Tunisian unless you make narrow strips.

Even the 1.5 mm gap between K and L hooks is weird! Such a gap does not exist between any other hook sizes until you get to the jumbo hooks. Traditionally (and inexplicably) there's a 3.0* mm jump from a Q/16 mm to an S/19 mm. *Q hooks can sometimes be 15 mm or 15.75 mm, depending on the brand.

That 6.5 mm-9.0 mm range is pivotal for certain kinds of fashion looks, certain kinds of yarn textures, and certain kinds of stitches. Without the right hook for the job, the designs can't come out their best, or worse: simply can't happen at all. Tunisian crochet designs are especially vulnerable.

Besides the Denise hooks mentioned in #2, look at all the choice I have now with the ChiaoGoo Tunisian L/8 mm hooks I brought home last month from the CGOA Chain Link Conference. Bigger photo here.

2009 is turning out to be my Year of the Crochet Hook. The last time I blogged about new crochet hooks was January 2007!

Tunisian Crochet Chemo Hat: Pros & Cons

In the midst of hosting house guests and attending the TNNA conference, a new crocheted hat happened, known as "Vanilla Crown." Early in this blog's life I talked about "Hat Yoga": a hat designing journey for my dear friend Kalli.

The Vanilla Crown is the latest addition to the Hat Yoga collection and the first to feature two tunisian stitches for specific reasons.

We're having a heat wave here, and my house guest is not used to the extremes of air conditioning and humid subtropical heat. After all the chemo she's had, she doesn't need the extra stress on her immune system. So I wanted to create a summer hat that breathes but protects, and is of course exquisitely soft. I chose Decadent Fibers' organic color-grown cotton in "vanilla".

I've watched some of my hats stretch out over years of use. Sometimes it's due to the yarn, sometimes the stitch or gauge. For this hat I focused most on which stitch and gauge. The yarn is bumpy and fleecy and for it to be summery, I wanted a stitch that wouldn't amp up the bump, thickness, or weight; and one that wouldn't add stretch. My thoughts turned to tunisian crochet.

I wanted to frame my friend's face with a gently flaring brim that wouldn't droop over time. I thought of how tunisian simple stitch (TSS), worked firmly, naturally curls. It's also solid enough to block the sun.

As for what I was in the mood for: I was not up for doing tunisian in the round, nor entrelac. I needed something mindless enough so that I could socialize while crocheting. We also like to watch movies together. I was willing to commit to crocheting a rectangle, then seaming it to create a hat band with just the right fit before adding the brim and crown.

So here's what I think of the result based on the design goals:

• I'm very happy with the tunisian corded knit stitch used for the band. It has zero elasticity horizontally (around the head) and just enough vertically so that the wearer can pull it down over the ears or not.
  

• The stitch is also pleasingly protective yet airy, and shows off the yarn's texture without adding more bulk. It's a great stitch to design with.

• Using TSS for the brim is also a good choice, once I worked out the amount of increases to add so that the brim flared just enough. (I ripped out these rows so many times before getting them right!)
  

• The yarn is even more beautiful than I expected. It's soft, luminous, and great with different skin tones. I couldn't resist adding some pearls around the crown!
  

Those are the pros, want the cons? Well:

• I ended up using 4 different kinds of hooks. This is a problem designing with tunisian. Sometimes you don't know what you're in for until you're part way through a new design! I discover missing sizes and styles once I need one while designing :)
  

• My favorite tunisian hook was barely long enough for the rectangular band. Once I added stitches for the brim, I struggled to use my favorite hook but eventually switched to some new bamboo circulars, which I didn't like. For the crown I could use a regular crochet hook, but kept switching it because the yarn worked distinctly better with one brand over others.
  

• I underestimated how much the finished crown affects the way the band settles around the head. That's not this design's fault, just a design issue I learned the hard way. And in this case the hat still fits fine, just not the way I originally envisioned it; it was meant to be a "bucket" hat and became a "cloche."
  

• Lastly, seaming is not my first choice for a hat design. The seam did its job of making the hat enjoyable to make while socializing, so I would make a hat this way again in a similar situation. The seam, which is crocheted, looks okay except for a lumpy bit at the brim, but it doesn't really show.
  

CGOA, Collectible Hooks, and Dee Stanziano!

My blog posts are stumbling over themselves to be written. Now that I have updated my handout for the Trendy Crochet class that I teach every year, I can resume blogging.

An article that I wrote for Yarn Market News (May'08, page 36) about CGOA's commemorative crochet hooks has been reprinted in full here (scroll down to June 16 entry). If you don't know what "HAS" is, the article will fill you in.

It's an honor to see my article on Dee Stanziano's blog! A big thank you to the YMN editor, Karin Strom, for giving permission to reprint it, and a big hug to Dee. (Can you tell from her photo how huggable she is?)You can see the classes she'll be teaching at the CGOA conference here (scroll down to "Stanziano").

This is a great time to thank Dee also for being CGOA's Volunteer Email Correspondent for six years. If anyone had a crochet question, Dee was there to answer! But that's not all. This amazing CGOA member also moderates the Hook Collector's Group forum (this is a special group within CGOA), has a large and happily active CGOA Chapter in Connecticut, is active in a wide variety of crochet forums, and has agreed to lead one of the guild's most important committees. Not only that but her husband and kids are delightful.

If you haven't yet met Dee, attend the conference next month and sign up for one of her classes!

Orlando Needlework Show Wrap-up

Took two excellent classes at the show and realized I didn't blog about them: Lily Chin's Color, Composition, Scale, Stitch and Pattern in 2-Dimensional Design and Darla Fanton's Tunisian Entrelac-to Felt or Not; Part 1-In the Round.

I've never seen this one offered by Lily before, so I had to take it out of curiosity. Within in the first 5 minutes I knew I was in the right class when she asked, "What is the difference between Art and Design?" I spent the rest of the conference mulling over our discussion!

It's funny to me now to type "Tunisian Entrelac in the Round" because before I took Darla's class it sounded exotic and advanced. I had never done any kind of tunisian crochet in the round, let alone entrelac. Yet it was perfectly easy to learn in class and I never once thought, "Holy cow, this tunisian entrelac in the round is crazy stuff". It seems more natural than working flat, actually.

I finished my project in class: a bowl to felt (see above photo). Now that I have it home, though, it's very soft and is the perfect size for my Hat Guru, so I think instead of felting it I'll edge the brim and let it be a hat!

The last bit of news is: YES Floridians! There WILL be another Orlando Needlework Show in September 2008!

UPDATE (Dec. 7): Dates for 2008 are being revised.

Color Fun for Designing & Stashbusting

I own more than one book about color and this one is my favorite. It's an inspiration recharge for me because the subjective effects of the color schemes are included. As I flip through it, some schemes grab me and put me in a mood, which then unlocks a cascade of designs.
The book seems to be geared toward interior decorating, so of course it would be wonderful for those who design home decor, but it works for me for fashion too. The newish home decor magazine, Domino, tends to tie in fashion and accessory trends.

Flipping through this book is a fun way to use up your yarn stash with updated color combinations. If you have 2 colors in your stash and you find an inspiring color scheme using them, then just bring the yarn and book with you to shop for a few balls of these colors, an you've got yourself a very stylish project (afghan or whatever).

Keeping a folder of multicolor stitch patterns near this book would result in some fresh, exciting swatches!

Garment Designer software--Use the Grid Settings!

I've been experimenting with Cochenille's Garment Designer software and I like it. So far it only enhances my natural way of planning a design. It doesn't bog me down or leave me doing most of the work after all.

This isn't the best photo but I don't have any designs published yet for which I can share better examples.

It all hinges for me on how I use the grid option (In the Display menu select "Grid settings" then input the exact measurements per stitch and per row based on your gauge swatch; use all decimal places). I don't think many people know what they can do with this, judging from conversations I've had. Thanks to the grid printouts customized to my stitch & row gauge, I just settle into my comfy chair with an espresso and shift into Contract Crocheter for Self mode. To write up the pattern in different sizes, I print these maps for each standard size and "merely" translate the map into text. What a load off.

Here's a closeup of the grid that is scaled exactly to the gauge of my stitch pattern repeat. This is not the most straightforward example (sorry!) but figure 1 box = 1 stitch with the height of two different rows averaged together. This is why I've drawn the purple lines for myself: the narrow purple strip is a vertical row of short sts, the wider purple strip is a row of taller sts. (Sure wish I could show you my gauge swatch. Should I have waited on blogging about this until better examples are published?!)

I haven't tried every stitch pattern under the sun yet, but so far I've found a way to create grids for any stitch pattern in grid-like rows (even those that don't seem like such). I don't know yet if I could come up with a way to do diagonal mesh-based st pats. In other words, I could do a grid for big ol' fans that stack in columns, but I don't know yet about fans that are offset and stack in alternating rows (i.e. the classic shell st pat).

I can do some motif-based constructions with this grid method but probably not all; and I might find a way to do ripple pats. These aside, so far I've done:

-rows of different heights alternating (pictured)

-pretty wide range of stitch repeat sizes

-a design with an exaggerated edging that would have been painful without this software.

Side-to-side construction (pictured) is easy-peasy.

Not sure how I'd do *cough*dorischan*cough* seamless-top-down-in-the-round!

Tools of Power

Just received 3 complete sets of Pony crochet hooks:

• 32-inch circulars in 12 sizes from 2mm-5.5mm
• 14-inch double-ended/tunisian hooks in 13 sizes from 2mm-6mm
• 8 plastic "Pony Pearl" hooks up to 10mm

I've accumulated many brands of crochet hooks over the years but these are my first Ponies. Survey the Pony bonanza:

I love the sleek finish of the aluminum hooks and the dense weight of the plastic ones. Between the excellent range of sizes and the quality of materials, that's power, baby.

Since I have some swatching of '70's stitch patterns to do, I now have a fullblown case of Crocheter's Itch. I'll put these hooks to use and report back.

How in the world should I organize, store, and display them? This is the first truly complete set of double-ended & tunisian hook sizes I've ever owned as well as the first circulars ever. I know knitters have storage issues with their circulars so I'm keeping them in their packages until I have a better idea (might have to design something).
If you want to feel the power, look for Ponies at your local yarn shop. If you don't see them, ask the shop owner to order them from Muench --you know, the people who brought us that outrageously sensuous Touch Me yarn.